TBR: The Odds by Suzanne Cleary

 Established in 2018, TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books.

 

We don’t expect an elevator pitch from a poet, but can you tell us about your work in 2-3 sentences?

 

I usually write a narrative poem that, along the way, dives into single moments and/or explores associations that arise as I write. I like poems that think-on-the-page, and find those especially fun to write.

 

Which poem/s did you most enjoy writing? Why? And which poem/s gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

I most enjoyed writing “For the Poet Who Writes to Me While Standing in Line at CVS, Waiting for His Mother’s Prescription” because the subject welcomed a wide range of material and emotion. It’s about those early months of the COVID quarantine, when I compulsively surfed the Internet for both information and distraction, which is how I got to reference both the royal family and snack food. It’s also one of the poems I most enjoy having written because it’s found a wide readership, especially in England and Ireland.   

 

I most struggled with writing “At the Feet of Michelangelo’s David.” The ending originally included lots of facts about the statue’s long trek to the museum, and lots (and lots) of speculation on my part as to what that might have looked like to passersby. Eventually, I realized I needed to look again at the statue itself in order to find the poem’s final lines.  

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

First, the low: For four years I submitted The Odds manuscript to all the best publishers and competitions, where sometimes it was a finalist or otherwise near-miss. I found this mostly encouraging, until the day that my dream publisher told me that The Odds had lost publication to one other book, essentially because my poems “sound too much alike.” This observation felt damning, and too accurate for comfort. So I gave up on The Odds. I turned my attention to a new-and-selected manuscript I’d begun a few years earlier; maybe that manuscript, instead, might be my fifth book. When, slowly and grudgingly, I returned to The Odds, I reordered the poems to highlight variation of subject, length, and form. I added poems I originally thought hadn’t fit.  When Jan Beatty selected the revised The Odds as winner of the 2024 Laura Boss Narrative Poetry Award, I’d won the jackpot! Not only did a fabulous and accomplished poet select my work, but I had “grown as a poet.” Ultimately, the struggle was good for me and for my book. As a bonus, that new-and-selected manuscript is nearly complete, which also feels good.

   

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

“Follow the poem, don’t lead.” I’m all about discovering as you write, about welcoming unforeseen ideas, associations, images, sounds. If I begin a poem knowing where the poem will end, the poem hardly feels worth writing; it feels restricted to the conscious mind, closed to the subconscious. Discoveries add resonance and depth to the poem, and—really important for me—add fun to the writing process.

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

Every poem includes something that I did not foresee, but, overall, I didn’t expect that the pandemic, either overtly or covertly, would appear so often in this book. I knew that I’d write about the passing of time, since I often do, but with The Odds I found myself feeling as if I were a historian, responsible for recording the quarantine years.

 

How did you find the title of your book?

 

I like a short book title because it’s easy for readers to remember. The Odds is my fifth full-length poetry collection and the odds were against this happening. The odds were against my living this long. Not coincidentally, I am drawn to writing about odd things, things that are unlikely subjects for poems. Also, I love the iamb, love it.

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

 

A figure in one of the poems eats a granola bar. Salted cashews also appear. As for recipes, sorry. I’m better at recommending restaurants.

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS AUTHOR:

www.suzanneclearypoet.com

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR TBR STACK: https://nyq.org/books/title/the-odds

 

 

 

 

TBR: The Book of Losman by K.E. Semmel

TBR [to be read], a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books.

 

Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

 

THE BOOK OF LOSMAN is about a literary translator in Copenhagen with Tourette Syndrome who becomes involved in a dubious and experimental drug study to retrieve his childhood memories in a tragicomic effort to find a cure for his condition.

 

Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And, which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

Daniel P. Losman—who goes simply by Losman—was very much a fun character to write. I’ve written 7 completed manuscripts over the past 30 years, five novels and two collections of stories (there were more manuscripts I simply abandoned). Nearly all of those manuscripts contain stories and characters that involve background research. This is especially so with one manuscript, a retelling of Beowulf set in the Southern Tier region of New York State. I spent 10 years writing that book, which is called IN THE COUNTRY OF MONSTROUS CREATURES. To do it properly, I had to read and reread Beowulf, I had to research the process of fracking (which plays an outsize role in the novel), and I had to invest a great deal of time learning more about this region of the state. I am from New York State—I love New York!—but I grew up in the Finger Lakes. There are great differences between these regions. Since I was after a certain degree of verisimilitude, research was necessary.

 

I pitched agents and eventually signed with one who loved the Beowulf retelling. He shopped it around and I got a lot of wonderful responses from major editors and publishers, though all of which were, ultimately, rejections. So I ended up giving up on the novel. Now it’s just a lonely Word doc on my laptop. I mention all this because, with The Book of Losman, I wanted to tell a simpler story, one that didn’t take a decade to finish or force me to spend countless hours doing research. I felt I knew Losman from the start. The two of us share some commonalities. He is a literary translator with Tourette, like me, and because of this his character traits slotted into place rather easily. Also, he lives in Denmark as I once did. Losman is not me, far from it. But because my life experiences are close to his, I didn’t have to do as much research. As a result, I was able to write the first draft in less than two years. 

 

The hardest character for me to write was Losman’s crush, Caroline Jensen. She’s an artist, and a bit of an odd duckling. I had to figure out a way to create her character without resorting to caricature. I didn’t want to write a story with a traditional romance, either, so there’s this awkward tension between them throughout the novel. Balancing that tension took some effort.

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

One interesting tidbit: this book actually started as a memoir. But the writing felt forced, and I limped along, not certain how to go about putting together a memoir. Besides, I kept asking myself, who wants to read a sad story about a boy with Tourette? I sure didn’t. I wanted to write something that contained both sadness and humor but was still entertaining. I’d been chewing on one particular idea for years—What if there was a pill that could return our childhood memories to us?—and it dawned on me that this was the perfect story for that idea. So I pulled one small scene from the memoir, the “truest” scene, and reimagined the entire book as fiction. Once I did that, the flood gates opened and the writing gushed. Fiction has always been my preferred medium. (Though I will add that I published a personal essay in HuffPost that served as all I wanted to say, or would have said, in a memoir.)

 

My agent loved this manuscript too, and he gave me some feedback that I incorporated. The book went out on submission but, like with the Beowulf retelling, I ended up getting only rejections. They were nearly all uniformly praiseful of my writing, but such praise often feels hollow when it’s accompanied by the words “it’s not right for us” or “we hope it finds the right home.”

 

While the book was out on submission, I began writing a middle grade novel. Once it became clear that The Book of Losman was going to suffer the same fate as In the Country of Monstrous Creatures, I made the decision to drop my agent (it was an amicable split; he does not represent middle grade books). I assumed, wrongly, that I would be able land another agent. I still don’t have an agent—and it’s not for lack of trying!

 

But I never stopped believing in The Book of Losman, so I submitted the manuscript to SFWP’s Literary Awards Program two or three years ago. I’ve known the publisher, Andrew Gifford, for years. SFWP published my translation of Simon Fruelund’s collection of stories, Milk, in 2013, and I even published a number of interviews with translators at SFWP’s online literary journal for a few years (“Translator’s Cut,” I called my interview series). Since I playfully incorporate stories and characters (and themes) from Simon’s work in The Book of Losman—the opening chapter is very much a reimagining of Simon’s story “Kramer” from that collection—the manuscript found fertile soil at SFWP. The manuscript didn’t win the contest, in fact it only made the longlist, but Andrew liked the story and decided to take a chance on publishing it. Around the same time, another indie publisher offered me a contract to publish the book, but I knew SFWP was the right choice. This has absolutely proved true.

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

Don’t take rejection personally. Your work can be rejected for many reasons, but you’ve got to keep plugging away, chasing your vision, and getting better. Once you find your stories, good things will happen. It may take 30 years, as it did for me, but if you’re patient and willing to work through all the rejections, you’ll publish your work eventually.

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

I don’t write with an outline. I put a character in a situation and see what happens, building the story as I go along. So in this sense, everything that happens is a surprise. It’s this kind of creativity that excites me enough to wake up at 5:00 a.m. to get back to work. It’s not until after the draft is complete that I go back and make sure things connect properly. Sometimes I have to rewrite or remove scenes, but generally speaking, in the first draft, I want to write as though I’m a reader engaging with this story for the first time. Which I am.

 

The biggest thing that surprised me in this particular novel is just how much Simon Fruelund’s work influenced the story. Perhaps it shouldn’t be such a surprise, since I’ve known him for more than fifteen years and I’ve translated three of his books. Simon’s ideas on literature and fiction have also proven hugely important to me. And he’s a friend. The Book of Losman is, in a sense, an homage to his work.

 

Still, even though I deliberately began The Book of Losman with a reimaging from one of his stories, I didn’t quite anticipate that Losman would share certain character affinities with Pelle, say, the main character from Simon’s novel The World and Varvara (published by Spuyten Duyvil in 2023) or that Losman would also be working on a book, like Pelle, with a publisher breathing down his neck. It was only after writing the manuscript that I realized how deep the connection ran. I don’t mind this at all. I love Simon’s books, and I think it’s wonderful that my novel is engaged in a dialogue with them.

 

How did you find the title of your book?

 

The Book of Losman has been the title for as long as I can remember, though I did hem and haw a bit once I realized there were already a lot of books that included “The Book of—” in the title. I debated just calling it Losman. But I couldn’t shake one important thematic significance that would justify me calling it simply Losman. There’s a kind of meta-quality to this novel, right from the opening sentence:

 

“When he moved to Copenhagen with his Danish girlfriend, Kat, fifteen years ago, Losman imagined his life like a Fodor’s guidebook, rich with possibility and adventure.”

 

Simply put: As a character, Losman is a kind of “book” to be read, translated, and understood. The narrative follows a circular pattern that only becomes clear at the end. So, to me, The Book of Losman always had to be the title. I’m happy with it.

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

 

My favorite Danish pastry makes an appearance: Tebirkes! They are hunks of buttery deliciousness.

 

*****

READ MORE ABOUT THIS AUTHOR: https://kesemmel.com/

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK: https://www.amazon.com/Book-Losman-K-Semmel/dp/1951631374/

 

 

 

 

TBR: Blood on the Brain by Esinam Bediako

TBR [to be read], a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books.

 

Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

 

Akosua, a young Ghanaian American woman, struggles to confront the challenges in her life, including a head injury, a breakup, and the reappearance of her absentee father. She deals with her problems the best way she knows how—by rushing headlong into new ones—until the accumulation of unresolved trauma finally catches up to her.

 

Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And, which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

Akosua and I have demographics in common—Ghanaian heritage, Detroit origins, suburban upbringing, coming of age in New York City. But most of the decisions Akosua makes are the opposite of what I’d do, for better or worse. She’s outspoken and impulsive; I’m shy and make way too many lists. It was fun to create an alter ego.

 

Akosua's mother challenged me (just as she did Akosua). For a while, all I had was her laugh, "a spooked flock of birds, a flutter of wings escaping to the sky." I had a sense of who she was, but it was hard to translate that onto the page.

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

The novel had been my MFA thesis, and after graduation, I got some encouraging responses from agents but didn't land one. Imposter syndrome plus anxiety about getting a "real" job and paying back my student loans led me away from writing. I gained a truly rewarding career as a teacher and educational writer, but I lost my confidence as a writer.

 

But then (~15 years post-MFA) the pandemic happened. Of course it was terrible and scary and felt like the end of the world; at the same time, during that period, I found my way back to writing. My husband convinced me to revise Blood on the Brain and submit it to Red Hen's Ann Petry Prize, and shockingly, I won the prize, which included publication.

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

To help me combat my anxiety about whether my writing was “good enough” for publication, my therapist said, “Remember the little girl inside you who just loves a good story? Write for her.'"

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

This is a story about identity, but initially, I also saw it as a story about a broken father/daughter relationship. As I wrote, I realized that it’s less about Akosua’s father and more about her dynamic with her mother. The final pages surprised me, too—but once I realized what the story is and isn’t about, the end made perfect sense.

 

How do you approach revision?

Teaching high school English helped me appreciate revision as an opportunity to re-see my work through fresh eyes. When students came for one-on-one help, I’d guide them to really dismantle their drafts and put them back together. Then I realized, “Ahh, I don’t take my own advice!” The new novel I'm working on has undergone radical transformations, which is a good thing.

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

Wisdom’s Fried Tilapia

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS AUTHOR:  www.esinambediako.com

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK: Bookshop

 

TBR: Rebel Falls by Tim Wendel

TBR [to be read], a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books. 

 

 

Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

 In 1864, during the last months of the Civil War, a troubled, young woman is sent to the border with Canada. Rory Chase’s assignment? To stop Confederate spies from seizing the lone Union warship left on the Great Lakes. (Much of this novel is based upon true events.)

 

Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

Rory Chase enthralled and confounded me. Early on, she disguised herself and tried to join a Yankee infantry regiment. After her identity was discovered, Rory became a Union spy. By late 1864, Confederate spies had targeted the U.S.S. Michigan and planned to bombard Cleveland, Buffalo and other cities on the eve of the presidential election. To stop them, Rory must find the courage to not only follow orders but know when to break the rule, too.

 

Also, I enjoyed writing about the rebel spies – John Yates Beall and Bennet Burley They are based on real-life people. Beall crossed paths with John Wilkes Booth, while Burley was a soldier of fortune from Scotland. When the war ended, he got away and became a foreign correspondent for The Daily Telegraph in London.

 

To stop the rebels, Rory needs the help of the wait staff at the Cataract House hotel, once a key stop on the Underground Railroad. That this sinister plot takes place in the shadow of Niagara Falls, one of the most captivating places in the world, was good fun to write.

       

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

On the road to publication, the novel was “orphaned” twice, meaning that my editors left for positions at other publishing houses. In the end, though, it worked out. Each of the three editors – Dean Smith, Michael McGandy and Mahinder Kingra  – brought distinctive reactions and insightful comments. It was up to me to incorporate their suggestions into the novel.

 

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

Remember that rejection and failure are not the same. To me, rejection is a temporary setback. It may really, really sting, but how you react to it is up to you. In comparison, failure means that you’ve moved on. Turned the page. And that may be what’s needed at the time. Still, the final choice is yours, and there’s something empowering about that. At least to me.

 

My first novel, CASTRO’S CURVEBALL, was rejected 33 times before it found a home with the Ballantine imprint at Random House. During that process, time and again, I saw ways to improve the story. Even when editors or agents ultimately turned it down, I believed I was making progress and was game to try again.

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

 By ingratiating herself to the rebel spies, trying to win them over, Rory risked losing her purpose, even herself as well. In the end, Rory was faced with a difficult decision – Join ‘Em, Leave ‘Em, or Take ‘Em Down. I didn’t start with that template, but eventually I realized that some of my favorite stories follow a similar organization, including THE GREAT GATSBY, THE HANDMAID’S TALE and THE OUTSIDERS.

 

 

How did you find the title of your book?

    

Gregg Wilhelm, a longtime friend, and director of the George Mason writing program, suggested it. A play off Niagara Falls. Then I took it a step further. Late in the novel, Beall and Burley, the rebel spies, discuss how the world will be different if they capture the Union warship. How the Confederacy could become a separate nation, with statues to Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson throughout the land, even perhaps erected in the shadow of Niagara Falls.

 

I wrote much of this book after moving to Charlottesville, Virginia, where era statues and views of our nation’s past can be contentious issues. Walking through town, you’re reminded of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy and how it still casts a long shadow.

 

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book?

 

 The Cataract House hotel was known for its fine food. Served family style in an expansive dining room with crystal chandeliers, the fare included roast beef, baked white fish, salad, roasted potatoes, succotash, along with a dessert trolly wheeled to your table. A new restaurant recently opened on the American side of the Falls based on an 1859 menu from the Cataract House.

 

Also, the Bourbon Old Fashioned was all the rage during the 1860s. That allowed me to have Rory Chase partake of the cocktail during a pivotal scene.

 

Bourbon Old Fashioned (Several of my characters love the cocktail. I do, too.)

From Liquor.com (https://www.liquor.com/recipes/bourbon-old-fashioned/)

1 teaspoon sugar

3 dashes Angostura bitters

1 teaspoon water

2 ounces bourbon

Add the sugar and bitters into a mixing glass, then add the water, and stir until the sugar is nearly dissolved. Fill the mixing glass with ice, add the bourbon, and stir until well-chilled. Strain into a rocks glass over one large ice cube.

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS AUTHOR: www.timwendel.com

 

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK:

https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501774881/rebel-falls/#bookTabs=1

 

 

READ AN EXCERPT FROM THIS BOOK:

https://www.timwendel.com/works.htm

 

TBR: Aisle 228 by Sandra Marchetti

TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and from time to time, a recipe. 

 

We don’t expect an elevator pitch from a poet, but can you tell us about your work in 2-3 sentences?

 

Aisle 228 is about the 2016 Chicago Cubs, listening to baseball on the radio, and going to games with my father. The book highlights milestones across Major League Baseball of the past 50 years and culminates in the Cubs World Series win. Baseball fans any team will enjoy this title, along amateur historians and readers of literary nonfiction—it also makes an excellent gift! 

 

 

What boundaries did you break in the writing of this book? Where does that sort of courage come from?

 

Well, I’m not sure about breaking boundaries, but I know of many female sports fans who were also writers who never published work about sports. Maybe they wrote it but didn’t show it to anyone? Not sure. Marianne Moore and Annie Dillard come to mind as two of them. Many women have come up to me after readings or panels and said wow, I never thought of sharing my experience with sports—they mention that they aren’t really athletes or that there wasn’t a place for their voice in that sphere. Other sports fans have approached me and said they never liked poetry but they liked these poems. Conversely, others say they never thought of writing poems about sports, but after hearing mine they have a “tennis poem” in them or something, and that delights me!

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

I started writing this book in 2013-2014. I work a 9-5 and wrote and edited this book on (short) winter and summer breaks and a few residencies I was lucky enough to get. It was rejected 100+ times. I went to trade publishers who didn’t know about poetry but liked the sports angle. I had an agent briefly until he realized that he couldn’t help me. I sent to dozens of contests only to hear from publishers “open to anything” that sports writing was definitely out. I heard it was too short. Sometimes I never heard back. I was told to self-publish dozens of times. I kept revising—every six months—trying to remember “every line must be a poem and the book itself should be one poem.”

 

The poems were largely written by 2017, but 2022 was the acceptance year. What kept me going was knowing this book was good and that someone should want to publish it. And I had to polish out every impurity to get there. Also, it helped that readers reached out to me asking when the book would be out and where they could get it. The buzz was palpable and I’m so grateful for that. It pained me that I couldn’t give this book to my audience so I kept going. I’m so grateful I found a press amenable to the subject matter.

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

“No threat, no poem.” ~Dave Smith

 

“Less is more.” –Maybe not writing advice, but as a “spare” poet, it’s always worked for me. I find we try to say things multiple times in our writing to ensure we’re getting our point across, but readers are smart and we don’t have to say it more than once.

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

There were a lot of surprises in the writing of this book. I guess the big one is that right in the middle of writing it, the Cubs won the World Series! Also, Ichiro’s retirement (he seemed like a demigod—almost like he’d never retire). So, those things changed the course of the manuscript. What started out as perhaps being a melancholy love song to this team of perpetual disappointment, quickly had to adapt. I was thrilled to write about a winner, but was almost intimidated by the prospect. A few publishers approached me wanting to publish the book back in 2016/7, hot on the heels of the World Series win, but it just wasn’t ready. For better or worse, I stuck to my guns on that one and the book became more holistic—not just about the team’s win, but a lot more, too.

 

How do you approach revision?

 

I work on individual poems for a long time. Sometimes a poem of 75 words lives in the revision process for two or three years. When polishing poems for a book, even poems I see as “done” sometimes need another pass. Not every poem in a book is going to be of equal quality (despite what people tell you). So, they may not all have the same “ceiling” of potential, but they at least need to have the same “floor”—does that make sense? So those that stand out as clunky during a read through years later still need work. I think part of what helped this book across the finish line was that two poems that seemed a little rough to me for years finally were “fixed” before the book was accepted. I had tinkered with them—revised them eight different ways—but refused to give up on them. When I finally got them right, the whole book just read better.

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

 

My favorite ballpark food is Gilroy Garlic Fries, available at Oracle Park in San Francisco. Enjoy them with a view of the Bay! Here’s my jerry-rigged home recipe:

 

½ bag frozen fries (Idaho Hand Cut Fries are a fave, or you can make your own potato wedges if you’re fancy)

 

5/6 large cloves of fresh garlic, minced

 

Freshly chopped Parsley, cilantro, or chive (according to taste)

 

Salt and pepper

 

Olive oil (can substitute truffle oil)

 

Parmesan cheese (optional)

 

1.)   Bake fries according to bag directions

2.)   Put all other ingredients in small bowl and mix

3.)   Add hot, baked fries to large bowl and pour mix on top

4.)   Use spatula to mix

5.)   Serve immediately (preferably with a steak sandwich or burger!)

 

(Optional: Therabreath Fresh Mint Mouthwash for after the meal. It does the trick!)

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS AUTHOR: https://www.pw.org/directory/writers/sandra_marchetti

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS PUBLISHER: https://www.sfasu.edu/sfapress/

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK:  https://www.tamupress.com/book/9781622889556/aisle-228/ OR https://www.amazon.com/Aisle-228-Sandra-Marchetti/dp/162288955X/

 

READ A SELECTION OF POEMS FROM THIS BOOK: https://www.havehashad.com/web_features/author/sandramarchetti

 

 

 

TBR: Hestia Strikes a Match by Christine Grillo

 TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and from time to time, a recipe.

 

Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

 

The year is 2023, and America has officially begun its second civil war. Meanwhile, Hestia Harris is forty, newly single, and her parents are absconding to the confederacy. She is adrift, save for her coworkers at the retirement village and her best friend, Mildred, an 84-year-old resident, who gleefully supports Hestia’s half-hearted but hopeful attempts to find love. 

 

Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

Writing Mildred, the 84-year-old retirement villager and best friend, was a joy, because I was able to draw on several older women from my life. My maternal grandmother used to look at me while she adjusted her dentures, and say, “Don’t get old, kid,” which to this day has me pondering what she thought the alternative was. My ex-husband’s aunt used to pull me aside when we were at family dinners and ask me how my sex life was. Like Mildred, she loved, loved to smoke. I probably had the most trouble writing Sarah, who is a beautiful young Black woman. As I white woman, I couldn’t presume to know her experience, so I tried to “write what you know,” which was Hestia’s well-meaning cluelessness.

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

Trying to find an agent who believed in this novel was difficult. My low point was when a smart, successful agent told me that she didn’t think she could sell it because it wasn’t landing squarely in any genre: it wasn’t rom-com enough, or dystopia enough, or literary enough. I nursed that wound for a while, but finally found someone who loved it. She sold it within two weeks of putting it on submission, and the process has been rainbows and unicorns ever since.

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

I’ll be the jerk who lists my two favorite pieces of writing advice. The first one will not be news to anyone, but kill your darlings. I’ve backed myself into so many writing corners because of a line or a moment that I love, but it turns out be only a dumb infatuation. The second piece of advice is to keep it simple. I’ve had so much writing overlooked because I thought I was being subtle or lyrical, clever or nuanced—but the truth is that no one reads my writing nearly as closely as I do. I have to keep reminding myself to write for the reader who sometimes skims.

 

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

HESTIA is a novel about friendship and love, and I guess I was surprised by how much I seemed to know, intuitively and comfortably, about friendship, and how little I knew about love. When I had to make my characters talk about why they wanted a partner, I found myself grasping. For young people, pairing up is such a biological drive that it doesn’t need to make sense. But I’m not young anymore, and when I look logically at partnership, it’s not clear why we need or want it. I canvassed friends about love and was surprised by the wide range of responses. Some people want a partner but can’t explain why, while others do the cost-benefit analysis and decide to take a pass.

 

How do you approach revision?

 

My best revisions happen when I open a new document and start re-writing a scene from memory and instinct. My worst revisions happen when I edit a scene that’s right in front of me. There’s something tyrannical about an existing document, the way it hems you in.

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

 

In HESTIA, trade routes to America have been disrupted by civil war, so there are some foods that are difficult to get. Things like prosciutto, macademia nuts, and Kentucky bourbon are hard to come by, and they take on a currency of their own. There is one character, an Italian named Marcello, who insists that ziti should be baked, like manicotti, and I can attest to the truth in that.

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS BOOK: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250883773/hestiastrikesamatch

 

BUY THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK:

If you can’t purchase the book at your local, independent bookstore, try using

https://bookshop.org/books/hestia-strikes-a-match/9780374609979

 

LISTEN TO AN EXCERPT OF THIS BOOK [AUDIO FILE]: https://soundcloud.com/macaudio-2/hestia-strikes-a-match-by-christine-grillo/s-KERQHr8prHg

TBR: Like Water in the Palm of My Hand by Lois Roma-Deeley

TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and from time to time, a recipe.

 

We don’t expect an elevator pitch from a poet, but can you tell us about your work in 2-3 sentences?

 

“Roma-Deeley’s poems seek to pitch imagination beyond itself to something more like divination. These are poems that show us ‘how hard it is to be a human being,’ but which also ‘celebrate the moment of possibility.’” — Daniel Tobin

 

Which poem/s did you most enjoy writing? Why? And, which poem/s gave you the most trouble, and why?

 

Some of the most enjoyable poems came out of collaborations with visual artists which lead me to surprising and completely unexpected places in my work.  More specifically:

 

The poems “Be There No End to the End of this Night” (originally published as “Be There No End to the End of this Day”), “Now That,” “Empty Spaces,” “How to Be Rooted,” “If When,” “The Love Poem (I Can Not Write),” and “If I Were Smarter, I’d Be More Afraid” (reprinted) were part of the exhibition Geology of Spirit: A Photo-Poetic Collaboration, with fine art photographers Patrick O'Brien and Cyd Peroni, and with poet Rosemarie Dombrowski. The poems “I Came Here for Some Answers” and “The Virgin River Speaks of Loneliness” were written in response to the work of visual artist Beth Shadur. The poems “What It Is or How to Get There” and “Why Moon Jellyfish Won’t Speak of Cancer” were written in response to the work of visual artist Cherie Buck-Hutchison.

https://www.geologyofspirit.com/

www.bethshadur.com/the-poetic-dialogue-project

 

 The more difficult poems to write were troubling emotionally. These came out of deeply painful personal experiences. Even though some of those poems garnered national attention, they were difficult to write and difficult to see published.   Several poems in the book came out of my own private experiences with breast cancer.  For example, the New Millennium Writings XLV contest, selected my poem “Why Moon Jellyfish Won’t Speak of Cancer” as a finalist. Such poems dealing with cancer were also include in Vice-Versa’s Illness as a Form of Existence Anthology, which republished “Why Moon Jellyfish Won’t Speak of Cancer” and also included “Absence in Five Parts.”  Similarly, the poem “In My Brother’s Recovery Room” was based on my experience with my older brother’s two week stay in the hospital due to his heart operation. This poem found a home in Italian Americana.

 

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

 

Almost every poem in this collection has been published. The collection, as a whole, has been a finalist and semi-finalist for national contests. I was pleased to know the poems and the collection as a whole resonated with various and varied audiences but it always stings to come close and “still no cigar.” However, I eventually was elated to find Kelsay Books as my new publisher and am so pleased with my experience with them.

 

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

 

My favorite pieces of writing advice are “write line by line,” “write until something surprises you” and “allow everything that wants to come into the poem, come into it.”   All these pieces of advice have one thing in common—they allow for a “give and take” between craft and imagination. For me, the best poems come when I am not clutching onto perfectionism—when I write a line and then allow my imagination to expand.  There is a kind of joy I experience when I write another line and see where that line will take me. At this point, I will remember that craft will help me shape the poem into its ultimate form. In other words, it is more than okay to be messy.

 

What surprised you in the writing of this book?

 

Many voices demanded to be heard in this book. I was surprised by how those voices connected with me and how they lead me on a journey toward a deeper understanding of “how very hard it is to be a human being.”

 

How did you find the title of your book?

 

This collection explores the nature of change and its relationship to time and timelessness which, to my mind, seem to co-exist within each of us. In addition, I am fascinated by the limits and lessons of memory and how memory often serves as a conduit to the past but can also be a bridge to the future.  The present moment is fraught with competing realities which seem to crystalize and then, too soon, disappear, “like water in the palm of my hand.” Are we, as human beings, the sum of our choices? Are we trapped or enlarged by those choices?

 

 

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

 

I am Italian-American and love to create a feast for my family and guests. So I would say this book would go perfectly with my Baked Ziti, stuffed mushrooms, Pinot Noir wine, crusty Italian bread served and Caprese Salad. I don’t use a written down recipe for the Baked Ziti. I just make the dish as my mother taught me. However, I’ll include a recipe for Caprese Salad, which is refreshing—as I hope readers will find of the poems in my book: https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/rachael-ray/caprese-salad-recipe-1939232

 

*****

 

READ MORE ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

https://www.loisroma-deeley.com/

 

READ MORE ABOUT THIS PUBLISHER:

https://kelsaybooks.com/products/like-water-in-the-palm-of-your-hand

 

ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR STACK:

https://kelsaybooks.com/collections/all

 

WATCH A VIDEO POEM, “Now That”:

https://youtu.be/5VOgDsSFb_g